Common sense and natural instinct will tell you what is fresh. The more processing steps your food has gone through, the less fresh it is. And it doesn’t stay fresh just because you bought it fresh. If you just let your produce linger in your fridge, it gets old and stale because fresh food is still alive (to a degree). And because it is living, it is prone to decay and rot. During transport, in the store, and in your fridge, your fruits and vegetables lose taste and healthful ingredients.
Fresh food includes all produce (fruit and vegetables), nuts, grains, legumes (beans, lentils, peas, garbanzos), and what you prepare from them. Fermented and dried foods are close to fresh food because they have undergone very little processing. Fermentation actually makes them healthier and more easily digestible, so sauerkraut and miso are naturally enriched with vitamins; our ancestors survived on them in bitter winters when no fresh produce was available. Freezing is an acceptable – but no perfect – modern way of preserving some freshness. Microwaving destroys too many phytonutrients; thaw and reheat in a lidded pot.
Why is fresh, organic food more healthful than processed, microwaved, fortified, enriched, canned, old, rancid, stale, milled food? Whole organic food contains more life-giving phytonutrients than produce that is grown conventionally. Phytonutrients are those special chemicals built up in the plant from water, soil, and sunlight. At one time, researchers thought they were not important for health. Now we are linking the diseases called “civilized” to the absence of phytonutrients in the Standard American Diet (“SAD”): obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, arthritis, depression, cancer – the list is endless. Phytonutrients are anti-inflammatory, given to us as presents from the plant world – hundreds of them in a single plant. In fact, organic food contains about one-third more than conventional, mostly because the soil in conventional agriculture has been deadened and depleted by chemical fertilizers. The health benefits of phytonutrients go beyond vitamins and minerals, and to this day we certainly have not discovered all of them.
The benefits of phytonutrients are transferred to animals that eat them, eventually to our meats and poultry. Organic lamb, for instance, has a very high vitamin C content because lambs are usually thrown out on the pasture soon after birth. They don’t get extra feed or antibiotics and hormones. All summer, they feed on untreated meadows. That is why their meat brims with the goods of sun-drenched, natural pastures. Unfortunately, even most of our organic meats are not grass-fed but grain-fed. Grains are unnatural to cows. What we then eat is an animal that was not healthy to begin with. Interestingly, we usually don’t eat predators and scavengers (cats, dogs, hyenas, vultures) – they are too far removed from the original, health-giving phytonutrients. And if we eat them – like lobster and shrimp that are the scavengers of the ocean floor – they usually come with a warning not to eat them too frequently. Omnivores, like pigs, fall into the category between grass-eaters and predators, and some cultures shun their meat too.
In additional to phytonutrients, fresh, organic food is more healthful because:
Fresh, organic food contains lower level of pesticides, herbicides, and in the case of meats and poultry, lower levels of hormones, antibiotics, and meat fresheners.
Fresh, organic food contains all the ingredients that correspond to our genetic needs, handed down to us from our evolutionary ancestors.
Organic, whole foods fuel mitochondria – those cell organs that act as the energy factories in your body. Phytonutrients feed directly into mitochondria, counteracting one of the most common complaints of our times: lack of energy.
Your body recognizes fresh, organic food as food, whereas it does not recognize many modern adulterated or entirely artificial molecules.
Fresh, organic food contains good fats, good carbohydrates, and balanced proteins, naturally, taking the “thinking” out of what to eat.
Fresh, organic food slows down the rate at which the blood sugar levels rise and therefore reduces insulin production. Sugar from the original source – plant – enters your blood slower, since the sugar is only available after plant cell walls have been broken down. Refined sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, in contrast, are available within seconds, swamping your system and acting as a poison – with the long-term consequence of “civilized” diseases.
Fresh, organic food is naturally full of fiber and therefore lowers cholesterol.
You must chew fresh, organic food more thoroughly, increasing saliva production and triggering digestive juices adequately. By contrast, junk food can be gobbled down, leaving your stomach and bowel overwhelmed and burdened.
Fresh, organic food leads to less calorie intake, because chewing and high fiber contents trigger earlier satiety, making you feel full longer. It satisfies your body’s needs for phytonutrients in ways that macaroni and cheese cannot.
Fresh, organic foods increase the bulk of stool, so it passes through the bowel faster, normalizing constipation and diarrhea. They also bind toxins and remove them faster from your gut. You won’t need extra bran.
Fresh, organic foods boost your immune strength, provide some natural antibiotics, and decrease inflammation. In fact, decreasing inflammation is the whole point because lower inflammation will reduce “civilized”, degenerative diseases including cancer.
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